


Ghost Rider in the Sky

by clv44



Series: Tales from the Wildemount Frontier [7]
Category: Critical Role (Web Series)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Alternate Universe - Historical, Alternate Universe - Human, Alternate Universe - No Powers, Alternate Universe - Western, Cowboys & Cowgirls, Drama, F/F, Gen, Lesbian Character, Lost Love, Native American Character(s), POV Yasha (Critical Role), Spirits, Yasha's Backstory (Critical Role)
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-22
Updated: 2020-01-22
Packaged: 2021-02-27 03:46:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,515
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22310515
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/clv44/pseuds/clv44
Summary: Yasha is wounded, her lover is probably dead and she has no shelter from the enormous dust storm that just swept up. Luckily, or maybe unluckily, she is chosen as a champion by a mysterious desert spirit.
Relationships: Beauregard Lionett/Yasha, Yasha/Zuala (Critical Role)
Series: Tales from the Wildemount Frontier [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1612876
Kudos: 16





	Ghost Rider in the Sky

**Author's Note:**

> Title taken from a Johnny Cash song.

Yasha could almost feel the energy being seeped from her body, draining out through the bullet hole in her shoulder. She reckoned that it had struck an artery, with the amount of blood gushing down her arm. She was tough, but not tough enough to go long with a bullet hole in her body.

Yasha knew pain. She had endured the puncture of bullets, the bite of an ax blade, and the impact of a man's fist. She had once even been trampled by a herd of wild horses. But she didn't think she had ever properly known pain until now, running for her life across the desert with a bullet lodged in her shoulder. Tears flew from her eyes and into her hair. Fallen twigs and hard earth bit her feet as the blood from her wound dripped onto the parched ground. Her limbs buzzed with adrenaline and her mind only told her one thing: "Run. Run as fast as you can and don't you dare look back." But there was another desire in her, a fire in her gut that wanted to consume. A fire that would drive her back to her tribe to slaughter every man, woman and child. But then she thought of Zuala's face, the way her soft hands fit into Yasha’s calloused ones. Clean hands, hands without the blood of thousands on them. What would Zuala think of her spilling even more?

Yasha's foot caught on a jutting stone; it tore the skin off her big toe as she fell face-down on the scorched ground. She knew she should get up and keep running; the whole tribe wouldn't stop until they'd killed her. But as she lay there under the overcast night sky, all she wanted to do was stay there and weep. She hadn't allowed herself to mourn, intent on running; any tears that had fallen had come unconsciously. But now, everything that had happened hours ago came rushing back to her. The flood of memories broke a dam inside her and the tears flowed freely; unrestrained.

She remembered meeting Zuala in her tent, their giggles of delight filling the tent like music as they kissed each other. She remembered the warm feeling in her gut. She remembered how she got a thrill from the risk they might be caught. She remembered being pulled along by her hair by a tight grip, thrashing and gnashing her teeth. She remembered Zuala begging her not to hurt anybody, even as the men beat their faces, covering them both with bruises. She remembered the righteous fury of the tribal council as they condemned them both to death. She remembered their night apart, tied to the posts on either side of the chopping block. She remembered the tearful whispers, the confessions of love.

All that had come after passed in a distorted haze of emotion. The fear when the first rays of the sun poked out from the horizon. The look of defeat on Zuala's bruised face as she was led first to the executioner. The ax being raised to the sky, the sun glinting off the newly sharpened blade and into Yasha's eye. At least, that's why she tells herself she looked away as the ax fell. She blamed the adrenaline for making her break her bonds and run, never even looking back once to see if they’d done it.

Now laying curled up on the hardened desert ground, she didn't know who to blame except herself. She deserved the painful sorrow in her chest, the bullet hole in her shoulder, the party of tribal warriors on her tail. Let them catch her, let them kill her; maybe she'd see Zuala again. But the thought of death sent another wave of cold fear through her. She had always thought of herself as Yasha, the Orphan Maker. She won every battle, slew every opponent. She _did not_ die. Then the ax had begun to drop and death had felt more real to her in that moment than it had on a thousand bloodstained battlefields. She pounded the ground with a fist that had taken the lives of thousands and cried out into the open plain. There was neither echo nor reply.

She laid her head back down on the ground and heard the vibration of hooves through the earth. She didn't move even though she wanted to run. She just closed her eyes and hoped to whatever gods or spirits that rode with her tribe would give her a merciful death. Something quick. Something painless. Something she didn't deserve.

The sound of hooves grew louder and Yasha got, painfully, to her feet. She would face her death like she was supposed to: staring it down, leaving a few bodies in her wake. She was Yasha, the Orphan Maker. And she was terrified.

She ran her hand through the still-wet blood running from her shoulder and wiped it on her face, leaving five lines of crimson. She breathed deeply, shakily, and turned to face death. But where she expected to see a party of warriors on horseback, armed with spears, guns and clubs, she only saw the empty black plains. Yasha whipped around, but there were no horses. She put her ear back to the ground; the thundering of hooves was almost deafening. She jumped back up, squinting against the black of the night. No torches, no hollering of warriors, no jostling of leather and jingling of reins. Yasha frowned. And that's when the storm came.

It struck without warning, an instantaneous blast of wind and sand that nearly knocked her back to the ground. She planted herself and gritted her teeth, covering her eyes as her heart was struck with another wave of cold fear. The sound of thundering hooves was all around her, trapping her. It was around, above, and below her. She clenched her fists, ready to drive them into the first rider she saw. The hooves were as loud as the wind around her. They almost blended with the howling gale, forming into one oppressive roar.

Yasha spun around, fists still clenched, until she caught sight of a figure on horseback, coming towards her at a walk. Yasha blinked; the man looked small, meaning he'd be far away, but when she moved around, she saw that the man's image was made out of the swirling sand right in front of her. She reached for it, hands combing through the flying dust, and the image of the rider shattered before being reformed by the storm, larger and closer than before. The image of the man continued to grow and Yasha saw that he was dressed in the style of the pale-skinned Wâsícu, one of their wide-brimmed hats canopying his face.

Yasha never saw the rider step out of the sand and into the real world, but soon he was before her, sitting atop a great black shire stallion. Yasha was more terrified the more she looked at him. His face was smooth from the eyes down, without nostrils or mouth, as if he were wearing a bandana of his own flesh. His clothes and hair flew in the wind, but in a different way to Yasha's. They weren't pushed or pulled by the gusts and gales around him; they just moved with them, his whole body seeming to blend in with the sand. It was the eyes that scared Yasha the most; they had no irises or pupils. They were a solid electric blue.

Yasha's legs gave out from under her and she fell on her knees before the spirit or god or whatever it was. She expected to die there, for the thing to strike her down for her cowardice and the bloodshed she had wrought over years of battle. She waited and waited, teeth chattering, but the blow never came. Instead, the curtain of flying sand pulled back from around the horse's hooves. Yasha raised her head to see six charred corpses lying at the spirit's feet. He tossed her something that _clacked_ when she caught it. She opened her fist to find six tribal pendants, similar to the one strung around her neck. She looked back at the spirit, who hadn't said a word, and got to her feet.

"What do you want from me?" she asked. 

The sand behind the spirit parted with a blast of air, creating a kind of tunnel that let Yasha see all the way to the horizon. A bolt of lightning struck a point far away and the thunder rolled around her as if the bolt had landed right next to her. She ducked and covered her ears. When she looked back up, the spirit was gone, but the storm still raged around her. The great parting in the storm had closed up again, leaving Yasha once more enveloped. She looked down; she was still holding the tribal pendants of the men and women who had been sent to kill her. She took a long, deep breath and started along the path she could no longer see through the flying sand.

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to @dorcasdeadowes for editing the rough draft of this one. Your thoroughness is greatly appreciated. :)


End file.
